1. Introduction
Since the dawn of civilization man has struggled with the problems presented by large rock blocks. Rock is difficult to remove from the earth, heavy to move, and hard to cut. However, when our ancestors wanted to build some thing of permanence, they built it from stone. The Egyptians buried their living gods, once deceased, in the Great Pyramids. The Greeks worshiped at the Acropolis of Athens. The Romans fed Christians to the lions at Rome's Coliseum.
Thankfully, the ingenuity of modern man has created more practical building materials. However, architects and designers cannot resist the creative pull of stone. Marble, especially, is large and heavy, but is also relatively fragile. Raw marble requires a lot of power to manipulate, but the power must be wielded with delicacy. The consequences for rough handling are damaged pieces. The damaged raw material must be either replaced at great economic cost, or repaired with great effort and diminished final quality.
To cut a sheet of marble usually requires at least two workers to carefully lower a sheet of marble onto a stationary cutting table. Then a worker lowers a circular saw onto the sheet, and cuts the marble work piece. The saw is typically well anchored to a stationary rig that allows a user to move the saw in only three directions. First, the saw is moved either left or right to position the saw at the desired place of cut. Then, the user pushes down to start cut, and finally moves the saw across the surface of the work piece to actually make the cut. After the marble work piece is positioned in a horizontal position, the work piece must be moved if the user desires to cut at anything other than a right angle. Hence, manipulating a marble work piece requires the pushing and pulling of a very resistant and massive body.
Further, it is very important that the cutting table be very well anchored. There are tremendous vibrations incidental to the cutting of marble and similar stone. Marble consists of an inconsistent matrix with some portions of it being harder than others. While cutting through a marble sheet, a user may start with a harder area and apply the appropriate pressure. When the saw then reaches a softer area, the cutting means might be pushed with excessive force. A cutting system that fails to restrict lateral motion, produces a sloppy, less than desirable cut.
In sum, the problems faced by one trying to cut a marble sheet are two-fold. First, the user must place the marble work piece onto the work surface of a table for cutting. And then, once so horizontally positioned, the user must maneuver the marble work piece.
2. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a cutting table for large stone work-pieces, such as marble, and a method for using the table.
3. Description of the Prior Art
U.S. Pat. No. 4,254,606 to Schumacher, II, et al. is titled, “Self-Contained Gasoline Driven Portable Masonry Saw.” A mechanism for swivelling and spring-mounting a machine sub-assembly, mounted to swivel about an axis of rotation, for example the cutting bench of a harvester thresher, which bench is supported on the movable frame of the machine by way of a lifting unit, consisting of a lifting cylinder and piston, and a spring element, a spring element of limited stroke being provided between the lifting unit and its support, and means, such as a hydraulic force transducer or the like, also being provided for the purpose of varying the spring force of the spring element.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,446,845 to Harding is titled, “Self-Contained Gasoline Driven Portable Masonry Saw.” Harding teaches a saw for cutting concrete blocks, bricks, marble, tile, stone and other objects. The masonry saw includes a gasoline engine for driving a saw blade through a belt drive arrangement coupled to an arbor shaft on which the blade rotates. The gasoline engine is mounted on a stationary support while the saw blade is pivotally mounted by means of a live pivot shaft for engagement and disengagement with the work-piece. A water trough and pump are provided for wet-cutting. The water pump is connected to an output shaft of the gasoline engine through a belt drive, which may be removed to permit dry-cutting of an object.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,915,334 to Cummings et al., titled, “Hydraulically controlled animal table and method of use” Cummings teaches a hydraulically controlled portable dual table with a gate which enables the examination of a calf or a sheep by restraining the animal while the rotatable tables are vertical with neck and body catches of one table. The table and animal are rotated to a horizontal position for examination, branding, dehorning or castration. The table and animal are returned to a vertical position and the neck and body catches released. The second table is employed to restrain the animal with its neck and body catches and lifted to a horizontal position for examination of the other side of the animal. The operation of the hydraulic controls and the examination can be performed by one person.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,793,564 to Lupi, is self-explanatory titled, “Rotary tool with combined abrasive and fragmentation action for producing profiles or cuts on sheets of fragile material such as marble, granite, stone, glass and the like.” Lupi more importantly illustrates the problems associated with marble cutting. Specifically, the problem is one of manipulating heavily and brittle work pieces that potentially can chip or break under the rigors of cutting.